Review: Transistor Transistor / Wolves

Transistor Transistor / Wolves
“Split EP”
(Level Plane)

Transistor Transistor:  It’s jagged and edgy, but not particularly aggressive.  More like, a controlled agitation.  They’ve got those quick, clean sounding guitars that get their subtle distortion more from the jacked volumes than any dirty channel feedback.  Songs are pressure cooked until parts just explode out in a furry of guitar strums and erratic paced percussions.  The guitars are very kinetic, busting forth with ample amounts of rapid strum furry and quick-change directions.  And the trick is, Transistor Transistor have taken all this crazy energy and focused it into something that doesn’t attack the listener.  Maybe pokes them here and there with a scraping yelp, but generally, this is like watching someone who is used to having their daily nervous breakdown, but they don’t know you are watching.  See how easily they speak to themselves about matters of the utmost importance, even though to you, it sounds slightly unbalanced.  But when you listen close, secrets of the universe are being revealed.

Wolves:  Sound a lot like Transistor Transistor.  A little louder, a little more distorted and definitely screamier with an edge.  More concerned with jacking together riffs than creating a song, even with the occasional slow down.  The monotone shouting doesn’t help the cause much either.

But for a split release, both these bands sound amazingly similar with Transistor Transistor weighing in with the more musically relevant contribution.